Last week Meg McLain’s story lit up the internet. She says she was cuffed, her ticket was ripped up, and she was kicked out of the airport after she refused the body scanner and tried to ask questions about the pat-down. The TSA took it seriously enough to quickly post security footage of the incident on their blog. I reached Meg by phone to find out more about what happened, and, especially, why she refused the body scanner in the first place. Here is the interview, which has been condensed and edited.

The TSA calls your account inaccurate.
The first interview I did was less than 30 minutes after it happened. I was frazzled, I was frightened. People get upset and make mistakes and I totally admit there was a few people that came through secondary screening that I didn’t see at the time.

People have pointed out inconsistencies between the original radio interview and the TSA video. How do you respond?
The camera angles are in such a way that it doesn’t show a lot of what happened. I think more people are focusing on the specifics of the radio interview, and those videos – which are very misleading – without focusing on the main issue. You can tell in that video even if I made it all up it’s still overly heavy-handed how they reacted.

How are the videos misleading?
There is a section where I was pulled to a second chair that is not included in there. There are a lot more agents and officers just off camera. There’s one angle where it only shows one of the two chairs in the section. It cuts to me walking away, but where they show me walking to in the second video is not where I walked to after that first video. It happened further on.

It sounds like a very traumatic experience.
I am a Liberty activist. I’ve been arrested before. I’ve seen all my friends be arrested. It’s something that I’m used to, but it never gets easier.

I’m not familiar, what is a Liberty activist?
It’s basically a movement to get 20,000 liberty-minded people to move to New Hampshire and become activists for liberty. Everyone has a different level of belief about what liberty is, but for me, personally, I believe that government is essentially a monopoly on violence. There’s a better society based on consensual agreements between human beings.

Live free or die, right?
Definitely. That’s why we chose New Hampshire.

Why do you object to the body scanner?
It takes a naked image of your body. For the government to require you be photographed naked in order to travel is invasive and dehumanizing.

You’ve read up on the procedures, you’ve heard talk about this online, why then did you choose to ride an airplane? Did you expect a different kind of security procedure than what you encountered?
For many years that they’ve had more and more progressively invasive procedures I’ve dealt with it in my own way. I’m pretty soft-spoken when I do activism, so I will talk to them about it, but I’ve never been in a position where I’ve been forced to choose between naked photos or this very invasive procedure. I had no idea that that was what I was going to be dealing with. I’ve even traveled without ID.

You purposefully left your ID at home and tried to fly.
I’ve done that a couple of times. Once it got to the point where they required ID, I carried ID, but I definitely voiced my opposition. But when it got to the point where you have to get naked or molested, that’s just too far.

Was this a premeditated activist project?
It was my intention that if I was chosen for the body scanner to refuse the body scanner. I knew that you could opt out of it, and they would give you this secondary screening. I had questions about before it happened, but I never refused the actual pat down. I just had questions. No one would answer my questions. Eventually they decided that because I had questions that they couldn’t answer they would rather just assume that I was declining to go through security. It was never my intention to miss my flight or get kicked out of the airport.

So each time you go through security it’s kind of like a micro-activist project where you raise awareness on a one-to-one level by making TSA workers answer your questions.
At this point in my life it’s I don’t even do these things as activism. I believe that I am a free person, I am a sovereign person, and I respect myself, and I’m not going to allow people to touch me like that without questioning it.

What are you going to do next time you fly?
I’m hoping to have a discussion with the TSA manager. If they do require me to do the enhanced pat-down, I’m going to request that a friend of mine stand outside the security area and record it. I want them to know there are people watching them.

Anything you’d like to say in conclusion?
I just want to say that a lot of people are focusing on the specifics of this. I told the story as best I could, as best as I could recall, and I’d like people to more focus on the issue at hand. We don’t have to subject ourselves to this. People need to step up and say no. If enough people say no, there’s nothing they can do.

And they shouldn’t! I went back and watched the video- someone from the TSA stands there for three minutes, while this idiot does most of the talking, and the TSA lady is apparently explaining to her how the process works. Meanwhile, plenty of other people make it through the process, without requiring someone to tell them what’s going to happen (you’re going to get patted down by airport security, BIG SHOCK!), and without breaking down into tears.

I don’t like the security-theater process any more than anyone else, but I don’t go out of my way to create a scene or hassle the TSA agents who are just trying to do a job and feed their kids. There’s no need to be a drama queen about it.

And being married to an Arab man, I ALWAYS get screened when we travel together, and he ALWAYS gets screened when he travels alone. That’s life. We don’t whine about it, we cooperate and get on with our trip.

They don’t check there. No cavity searches. Oh, and the backscatter doesn’t expose anything hidden in the cavities so anything in the anus or vagina would remain hidden so long as it could get past a conventional metal detector.

This was accidently posted as a new comment, so I’m reposting it in the appropriate place:
JennQPublic – I sure you thought that was a very clever response. Of course, because you realized that you could not defend your original comment, you chose to deflect attention. OBVIOUSLY, I never once suggested that the TSA was going to *literally* a–f– anyone. What I was saying, and I’ll admit when I’m not eloquent, was that it is the people are not afraid to make a scene who prevent the little people from being taken advantage of and bullied by large powerful entities. I don’t remotely care about the woman in this story and am not defending her in particular. What I am saying is that your comment essentially says that we should just submit, which is wholly and utterly wrong. And standing up for yourself is not being a drama queen.

I agree, they should be profiling men and women of middle eastern descent and performing extra screening methods on them…especially if they have a funny accent, believe in imaginary fairies and are sweating so badly they actually smell of BO.

I support her goals, but I still think she’s a freaking liar. I also don’t like the “I’m frazzled” excuse for her inaccuracies. This was clearly premeditated (or she knew there was a decent chance something like this would happen), and it’s not like the interview is something that happened to her. If you’re not ready for an interview, don’t schedule one…

How is she lying? She expected to be told to take the “enhanced” pat-down and to be able to ask some questions about it, then get the patdown and make her flight. Instead she was detained and then ejected from the airport, with who-knows-what going on in the parts of the video that we can’t see (none of which has audio, either.) Being frazzled after a unexpected result isn’t unusual.

Have you read the original article on the incident and watched the videos? There are a lot of things she says happened within the first few minutes of her being there (being pulled, being cuffed, crying with no tissue, being screamed at, no one going through the scan/patdown while she was there) that simply did not happen. More than just a “Oh, I was frazzled and remembered it wrong.” She also works for a radio station, so you do the math.

My general understanding of security cameras is that you’re not allowed to record audio without notifying people (such as a sign on a door), however, you CAN record video of them without notice. Many business’ choose to only record video to avoid the possible controversy over the recording of audio. It does make security related investigations more difficult to only have video.

Video recorders often only record several frames per second (so its a series of still frames rather than video), vs standard video of about 25+ FPS. In the past, this was due to storage capacity (a 1 hour of 30FPS video tape can old 7.5 hours of 4FPS video). With digital recording, the same issues apply, but more modern hard drives are cheap enough and large enough that many providers are now saving actual video.

How is she lying you ask??? If you listen to her interview she knew what was involved in an enhanced pat down for first she said that she was subject to one once before where the squeezed her breast and it hurt and then latter in the same interview she said she had watched one on the Internet and that the breast squeezing didn’t happen to her.

It sounds like the “Free State Project”. If it is, they graded states based on liberty-friendly criteria, gauged the likelihood that a moderately-sized group could influence policy on a statewide level, looked at whether it was possible for a group that size to move in and get established in a reasonable timeframe without disrupting the local economy, and voted on several candidate states (I remember Wyoming was one of the other top contenders).

That actually sounds like a good idea. Get enough people that feel the way you do to a low-populous state to assert your believes. It’s the most efficient way to gain political momentum and make state-wide change which in theory can translate into national change.

I joined their Facebook group. New Hampshire has good personal liberty laws, a small state government, weak legislature and a low enough population where several thousand like-minded people can make a difference politically. Some towns are still run by town hall meetings. Taxes are low. After I get my degree, it’s one of the states I’ve considered moving to.

The Free State Project (I’m not active in it, I don’t speak for them, I just clicked a link on Facebook) seems to be ‘personal responsibility and small government’, not ‘hoard guns for the zombie commie apocalypse!!!!1!!one!’. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get my tin foil hat adjusted.

As a New Hampshire native I must say that we shudder at statements like hers. Most of us fervently hope that activists, extremists, and those who want to move to NH because of their political agendas stay at home or move somewhere else. We neither need you or want you. Leave us alone.

You have to love the fact that the state symbol of New Hampshire is a pile of rubble. I had a partner from NH. I used to tell him that his slogan should be “live free and die” because no one gets out of this place alive. He didn’t appreciate the sentiment.

Why are there people on the Internet that are so mind-bogglingly stupid that they would get upset because someone used the wrong gender identifier to refer to someone who is nothing but a batch of words and not physically a person for the commenter to view and identify?

Yes, Michaela, he said “he”. He said that because there was a 50/50 chance that either “he” or “she” would become the mainstream default that people think to use, and “he” won it out. Get over it, you worthless thing.

I love the “you’re causing a disturbance in my daily life, I know you want change, but can you maybe do that quietly while standing the corner?” attitude that seems to have soaked into todays mainstream society.

It isn’t as much that she wants to speak out (though it would annoy me if someone doing that delayed me from getting to my flight). However, the lying/exaggerating is not the correct way to get things done.

I think it depends on the questions she was asking. If she was asking what was involved in the enhanced pat down, and wanting to know what was going to be done, and the TSA just ignored her and kept asking her to comply without telling her what she was being required to comply with, then she’s justified. If she was refusing to consent until she knew what she was consenting to, that’s not refusal; it’s smart. You never agree to something unless you know what you’re agreeing to. I’m sure we here at the Consumerist can see the wisdom of that.

If she was asking unrelated or irrelevant questions, then her refusal to submit to the patdown until her irrelevant questions were answered is a refusal of the patdown.

I’m no fan of the tea party, but I also don’t like generalizations, either. They may all seem like crazy people in some aspects, but the tea party group’s main beef with government is that it’s too invasive, not that it shouldn’t exist. They don’t want to abolish government. This woman’s idea of liberty is that everyone just agrees to treat each other well, and that government is not necessary to do this – nevermind that laws are required precisely because people figured out right around the dawn of time that people don’t treat each other well and there needs to be a governing body to enforce prosecution of those who step beyond the boundaries we’ve set for ourselves as a society.

There is no Tea Party endorsed set of goals – they refuse to be that organized. Every member thinks it’s something else. I see people that post constantly about how it’s all about bringing religion back into schools and government.

No offense, but aren’t her political leanings contrary wit the Tea Party? She strikes me as being on the opposite side of the political spectrum as those that [typically] represent the Tea Party. Just saying.

I watched both videos entirely and listened to her interview. Very little of what she said actually happened. If you’re going to be an activist, at least be honest about it. It doesn’t help your cause to blow everything out of proportion or lie.

Soooo, Do you have any other comebacks, or will you now ACTUALLY go and see the tapes and interviews for yourself, or will you continue to simply make lame assumptions based on what other people type about the things you see on some websites? I really would like to know FROM YOU, because obviously you haven’t watched the vids or listened to the interview. Because if you had, you would never have made your initial comment in the first place. Asshole.

maybe i’m missing something obvious, but can anybody explain why the drudge report has had these TSA horror stories as its top headline for the past couple weeks?

i’m generalizing here, but it seems like the neocons are framing this as ‘big brother going out of control’…. i thought the republicans were the ones who are in favor of more invasive searches in the interest of national security (as opposed to the liberal view that this is a clear invasion of privacy and personal freedom, regardless of national security). shouldn’t the liberals be a lot more ‘up in arms’ about this than conservatives? or is this just another vehicle with which to attack/glorify the president?

i’m honestly not trying to start a partisan flamewar, but the commentary on this sorta makes no sense to me in terms of where the criticism is coming from.

Because people are stupid. Because people see who’s in office NOW, and think it’s their fault. For instance, 2/3 of the US believe obama was responsible for the bailouts, when it was actually Bush, it’s all about spin, and blame.

I told the story as best I could, as best as I could recall, and I’d like people to more focus on the issue at hand. We don’t have to subject ourselves to this.

Whatever version of events is the truth, her quote above (emphasis mine) is really the take home message. These new measures don’t do anything to increase security. They probably wouldn’t have caught the underwear bomber and certainly wouldn’t detect an explosive device concealed within a body cavity.

Really? I kinda had that message long before her stunt, when I first read about the scanners in the news and Consumerist. That highlighted quote actually makes me angry, because it’s complete side-stepping of the question, “Oh, don’t pay attention to all the lies I told! Let’s go back to the part where scanners are bad.” WE KNOW scanners suck, thanks. So lets get back to the part where you lie to get some attention, and make us all fear that opting out is going to be a war. It may be, or it may not, but I’d like to make that determination based on the facts, thanks.

I told the story as best I could, as best as I could recall, and I’d like people to more focus on the issue at hand. We don’t have to subject ourselves to this.

Whatever version of events is the truth, her quote above (emphasis mine) is really the take home message. These new measures don’t do anything to increase security. They probably wouldn’t have caught the underwear bomber and certainly wouldn’t detect an explosive device concealed within a body cavity.

Sorry, I agree with her, and the pilot that refused to be scanned. At some point, people have to buck the system and stand up for our rights. Maybe not a full-fledged revolution, and although we pretty much have the most invasive, largest government in our country’s history…they still are not big enough that we should fear it, or fear protesting it.

It just seems strange to me when people like her, the pilot, or even Ron Paul are considered nut jobs or troublemakers.

Most people do not want to rock the boat. They jump through whatever hoops are necessary in order to reach their destination, and are too afraid of The Consequences to object to the increasingly invasive “hoops” … and then resent those people who have the gumption to state their objections, the people who risk the and face the consequences, because it makes things “inconvenient” for themselves.

While reporters and random individuals will go on about the new “security” measures being deplorable and invasive–and useless–there are enough people willing to put up with them and the “illusion” of security they provide that it makes it rather difficult to tone things down a bit. :/

Ron Paul is not considered a nut job for is issues with civil liberties. Ron Paul (and moreso hi son Rand Paul) is considered a nutjob for his desire to abolish all government social programs, the IRS, the department of education, the department of agriculture, the EPA, the FCC, the FDA, etc.

Because most of us consider libertarian fantasy land to basically just be a really bad dickens novel where scrooge is to be seen as the hero.

People have a fundamental human right to not be bullied and/or coerced to submit to whatever rules a powerful entity makes. When did we start defaulting to submitting instead of demanding that the new rule be proven effectual and worth the downsides?

Her story did not match up to the video. I can not understand why she is getting so much press.
the tape easily proves not only one lie – she tells us that they yelled when she refused the scanner OPT OUT – watch the video no one gives here a second glance and the TSA Agents walk and move around not paying her a slight bit of attention. not only two lies – said she was grabbed by the arm and led to the secondary screening area – but we see her in the video calmly walking behind the TSA agent. not only three lies – said that she was not able to respond and the TSA agent was YELLING as her. Again the video shows agents talking to her but none of them display body language that indicates yelling and none of the folks getting screened are looking over to see a incident happening attraction that getting yelled at by the TSA would make normal people look. Handcuffed = lie, no one using the body scanner = lie
couldn’t wipe my face = lie – twice a TSA agent hands her a paper towel to wipe her face.

At this point her creditability = ZERO

When you tell this many bold faced lies that are easily disproved. Come on Ben why did you even waste our time with this interview.

There are no timecodes on the video, so we only have the TSA’s word that they represent contiguous spans of time. Hypothetically, assume that there was a period of time between video 1 and video 2 not captured on video, or at least not released by TSA. If there was such a period, do any of your arguments still hold up?

I belive a lot is happening off-camera from what the TSA provided. It’s not unlike them to conveniently leave cameras off or focused elsewhere when they want to do something that’s questionably legal, or outright illegal. So soon have we all forgotten the stories where the cameras were off while TSA agents were stealing countless amounts of money and jewelry (a 20k watch?) from the very people they were supposedly protecting?

Sure, I’ll just hop on a boat to Europe. Should be there in a few weeks.

And to your point…a lot of people AREN’T flying. They recognize the government is overstepping their authority, and refuse to fly. And what happens? The airlines whine about sales going down, then will probably need a government bailout with the tax dollars of the same people that refused to support their naked body scans and genital groping in the first place.

Can you please just picture for a second your 16-year old daughter standing in one of these, in a position of surrender (for lack of a better term), arms and legs spread? This child is being viewed and her picture stored by humans. Humans suck and (sorry, guys) there is certainly a fair percentage of men that behave sexually inappropriately when viewing even an outline of the human form. Do you really want that female form to be your daughter’s? Or son’s? Or wife’s? Or your own?

… so she basically showed up at the airport specifically to cause trouble. She forgot her ID, pretty much guaranteeing that she’d be subject to a more intensive screening, and when they tried to subject her to it is where the trouble started.

This was a publicity stunt to drum up recognition and publicity for her little grass roots movement, nothing more.

I don’t disagree with what she stands for, but if this was an average woman who got treated this way it would have a lot more meaning. Now it’s like “See? See? I’m making a point!” which frankly the average person does not care to listen to. This whole “I try to be a pain in the ass on purpose” thing isn’t just challenging the system, it’s alienating her from normal people who might otherwise care.

Flying without ID on purpose, going there just to cause problems, “I’ve been arrested before, I’m used to it…”? Thanks, lady.

I can’t really disagree with her. Airports are stating to feel like mini police states were anything less than total submission could get you in trouble.

I hate it.

I’d hate it less if the TSA agents were well educated on my rights as well and would treat me like a human being instead of like cattle. Unforuneately, the TSA agents don’t seem well educated on anything let alone what my rights are.

It’s everyone’s right to refuse a body scan or a pat down, it’s also the airline and TSA’s right to refuse to let them fly. I think they are damned if they do, damned if they don’t. They are either not doing enough to protect us or doing too much.

I would be interested in knowing if anyone has a better way of screening people? I would guess it’s incredibly difficult, I mean terrorists are putting bombs in dogs now, for heaven’s sake. I don’t know of the extent of training TSA employees go through, but perhaps that is where the improvement is needed. I don’t know, I’d rather have a body scan or pat down vs. watch or be involved in an act of terrorism.

there are rules in society…generally they’re for the greater good…often reactions to an event, such as 9/11…now, security might be tightened up because of her actions, in case it was a publicity stunt or a distraction so bad ppl can sneak aboard

she wants to be free, live on your own island

there should be better training to make security effective

yes, taking a body picture is invasive, but how many times is one’s privacy “invaded” on a daily basis anyway ?

The video (yes, I know, missing timestamps and camera angles) directly refute a lot of what she said, such as being handcuffed the entire time. SteveDave did a good job of cataloguing all of that in the original article, if you want to read that.

The lack of audio probably helps her more than it hurts her. Without audio, she can argue that she did nothing wrong and the TSA and police were overzealous – an allegation I’m inclined to believe to an extent. With audio, we could prove or disprove whether she said anything to egg them on – an allegation without evidence, so far, but also something I’m inclined to believe, given that there have been plenty of people taking the patdown over the scanners, so it alone is not something that would normally set off a TSA employee.

I understand you don’t want to be frisked by the TSA , but are you sure they REALLY want to see you “naked”? Are you even sure they want to touch/feel you? I’m can’t even think of 5 people off hand who would want to see me nude right now, let alone touch/semi-grope me.

True, someone will show a story of a few TSA agents who are convicted of a sex offense, which of course can be said of many people. I mean, how many shoe sales people are convicted of sex offenses and they get to touch your bare feet with their bare hands not even on camera!!!! There is no such thing as 100% detection rate or being able to tell the future.

The video (yes, I know, missing timestamps and camera angles) directly refute a lot of what she said, such as being handcuffed the entire time. SteveDave did a good job of cataloguing all of that in the original article, if you want to read that.

The lack of audio probably helps her more than it hurts her. Without audio, she can argue that she did nothing wrong and the TSA and police were overzealous – an allegation I’m inclined to believe to an extent. With audio, we could prove or disprove whether she said anything to egg them on – an allegation without evidence, so far, but also something I’m inclined to believe, given that there have been plenty of people taking the patdown over the scanners, so it alone is not something that would normally set off a TSA employee.

Wow. She’s one of those people that doesn’t like to even carry ID. And it’s amazing how many people lately seem to emerge from their cave and are so shocked by what airport security is like now, despite the months of news stories on backscatters since the underwear bomber in December last year.

I hope that the TSA levels some Civil Penalties and Defamation, Libel suits against her, her radio station and anyone involved in these publicity stunts. Like them or not it is not the TSA workers who make these rules people they just follow them like the Military, Civil Servants, and any other worker. If you dont like the rules vent against the higher ups (AKA Congressman, Senators, others). Lastly for all of those people planning to Opt-Out on the Day before Thanksgiving and slow down screening to make a point. Pick another day where you are not going to cause others who don’t agree with your beliefs any problems making their flights to see their loved ones. Yes this does include myself and my family. If you cause me to miss my flight with your shenanigans I fully plan to vent publicly on air if possible and publicly shame you for screwing the rest of us! Happy Holidays…..

For the love of GOD, can I have her seat? If you want to see me naked, you get what you deserve. It’s like going to the hospital…if you bitch and scream about having to wear that gown and you don’t it doesn’t make the news. Show your ass just like everyone else and move along.

Um, trying to enlighten a TSA molester or thug is like trying to enlighten a zombie from eating your brain. They’re government union employees doing what their government union employee supervisor tells them to do. They are trained to not ask questions. They are trained to treat the general public as if they are criminals.

If they are going to have TSA agents grope everyone’s private parts, they need to have licensed physicians, or at least PAs, do the fondling. It is uncomfortable enough to have my junk fondled and get probed by my doctor. I am not going to let some stranger fondle my junk.

How do we know that these TSA “screeners” are not convicted sex offenders? What medical training have they received? (Basic first aid and CPR do not count.)

I wonder if El Al gropes their passengers’ private parts or does a virtual strip search of them and that’s why they haven’t had any incidents in years?

TSA is not Union – They are Exempt from Unions.
El Al does WAY More than the TSA. I would Love for the US to take up how EL AL and the Israeli’s do security but Americans COULD NOT HANDLE what they do. You think this is bad, the Israeli’s are Far Tougher, and will drop your butt if you look the wrong way – No Questions, No Issues, At Gun Point and you can guarantee you complain about rights now, see where that gets you with them! PLEASE Do Let us do this and all the babies whining about going through a scanner would shut up quickly!

Excuse me, I work for the TSA. I’m not a molester. I’m not a thug. I’m a college student majoring in astrophysics and trying to support myself through college. TSA comes from all walks of life. But a big majority are former police officers and military. And a large chunk are college students, parents, grandmothers, Teachers with part time jobs. You really want to look at a man who served in Iraq for two years defending your country, or a 60 year old grandmother a molester?

JennQPublic – I sure you thought that was a very clever response. Of course, because you realized that you could not defend your original comment, you chose to deflect attention. OBVIOUSLY, I never once suggested that the TSA was going to *literally* a–f– anyone. What I was saying, and I’ll admit when I’m not eloquent, was that it is the people are not afraid to make a scene who prevent the little people from being taken advantage of and bullied by large powerful entities. I don’t remotely care about the woman in this story and am not defending her in particular. What I am saying is that your comment essentially says that we should just submit, which is wholly and utterly wrong. And standing up for yourself is not being a drama queen.

I work for the TSA. I’m telling you flat out she is lying. Once she is escorted out to the exit lane, which is right next where she is being screened, the TSA has no more interaction with her. Ask anyone you know that has ever been escorted out. It happens on a daily basis and the person is usually escorted out because we allow them to take stuff that can’t go in the airplane cabin back to the ticket counter so they can send it to checked baggage.

And there are no gaps between the time she gets up with her stuff to the time she walks out of the exit lane. This woman is a liar.

I can understand taking up a cause. There are plenty of things I don’t like about the way our government works, but I also understand that credibility means everything. Once you’re proven a liar then your credibility on issues like this is gone.

Contrary to what most people believe, most of the TSA agents I work with are pretty nice which you can see in that video (the lady kindly handing Megan paper towels). Of course there are going to be jerks. But it’s the same as if you go to a restaurant. A lot of times you will have great service. Sometimes you won’t. I’m not saying it excuses it, but it’s hard to control someone’s personality all the time. People have bad days. That’s right, TSA agents are people too. And for the most part, if you come in friendly you get treated friendly. If you come in with an attitude you may get attitude back. That is exactly how people respond to you anywhere else in the world so why are people surprised that some TSA agents won’t allow people to berate them?

Going through security is not difficult. I notice that a lot of people come in so scatter brained and worried about their travel plans that they don’t pay attention to what they need to do to get through quick. Security is an after thought to them. Many people that get so upset come to the airport not realizing that yes, there is real security going on (not “security theater” as some of you claim).

There are a lot of people out there on message boards and in the news, and on their blogs, that don’t understand the need for certain security measures. I see a lot of people not thinking things through and not thinking critically. Currently, those scanners and the pat downs are THE BEST methods we have to find hidden explosives that the metal detectors miss. Should we not use them just because people don’t like them, even though the old security methods had holes in them? It’s not that we want everyone to have to go through those scanners and pat downs, it’s that the old methods will not catch our biggest threat: bombs. So we need these methods until something better is developed.